


Lost

by floatingaway4



Category: Red White & Royal Blue - Casey McQuiston
Genre: Angst, Drabble, Established Relationship, Henry Needs A Hug, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-15
Updated: 2020-07-15
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:27:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25289053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/floatingaway4/pseuds/floatingaway4
Summary: Henry wants to be left alone. He does.
Relationships: Alex Claremont-Diaz/Henry Fox-Mountchristen-Windsor
Comments: 14
Kudos: 189





	Lost

Tears roll down his face. No one comes to look for him. He hadn’t really expected any of them to, but still... 

His mother had looked dazed. She hadn’t even looked up when Henry bolted out of the room. Philip had been working on his stiff upper lip and Henry had wanted nothing more than to punch his stupid face. Bea had looked glazed over, unfocused, leaning heavily against the wall, and Henry thought she was probably drunk or stoned. So no, none of them will be searching for him. Not that he really wants any of them to. 

He wants to be alone. 

If someone came to find him, they might want to talk. And Henry very definitely does not want to talk. Why else would he have slammed himself into this storage closet and slid down the wall to sit on the grubby linoleum floor? Yes, it was partly to avoid the scrum of reporters he could hear in the lobby at the other end of the hall. But it was also because he doesn’t need to talk to anyone except the one person he’ll never talk to again. 

He wants to be left alone. He does. 

He pulls his knees to his chest and wraps his arms around them. He thinks about his friends from Eton and realizes “friends” might be generous. There isn’t one person there he would …

Something flutters at the nape of his neck. 

Not one person there he would want to have here, would want to talk to... God, the whole idea is horrifying. Talking to one of his classmates about his father dying. Boys he’s known since childhood, who throw around insults like “faggot” and “poofter” so often Henry has stopped worrying whether they were aimed at him. Mostly. 

Well, there’s Pez, he’s always been a good friend but Henry isn’t sure they can talk about serious things and Christ, he’s Henry’s only real friend so he can’t scare him off by talking about his emotions and crying in front of him. 

Can he? 

That flutter again, light pressure, tickling the back of his neck, that moves down to his shoulders...maybe a fly got trapped in here with him. He can’t bring himself to care or to brush it away. 

He closes his eyes tightly, holding onto the memory of his father’s last breath. His dad...he doesn’t have a dad anymore. He runs a hand through his hair and stares up at the harsh, half burnt-out fluorescent light on the ceiling, willing the tears to stop. His eyes hurt and burn and so does his chest and there’s a tightness coiling around him. He wonders vaguely if he’s too young to have a heart attack. 

It occurs to Henry that he’s been sitting here for a while and none of his security staff have come to look for him either. He can’t remember if any of them were in the hallway when he bolted out of his father’s room but they must have been. Shit, how pathetic is it that he kind of wants one of them to come and knock on the door. There’s a new guy, Sean or something, who seems like he has a personality under all the polite deference. Henry’s usually good about getting to know the people who work for his family but he’s been distracted lately. 

_ “Oh, baby,”  _ a whispered voice from nowhere. Great, now he’s hallucinating too. Maybe he’ll go insane and get locked away somewhere like a tragic character in the novels he likes to bury himself in. 

And even if one of them came to find him, it’s not like they get paid to listen to him drone on about his dad. Or god, what if they stayed and listened to him  _ because _ they were being paid. That’s ….worse. It’s definitely worse than having no one to talk to at all. 

The tightness is there, again, in his chest. Henry heaves a deep breath and wills it away. If it is a heart attack, at least he’s already in a hospital. 

He heaves a whole new sob as it hits him that there will be a funeral and he’ll have to survive that too, somehow. A royal funeral, which means parts of it will be televised because someone gave the public the idea that they have a fucking right to be part of these things, that grief is a spectator sport. 

The bands of pressure around his chest tighten again. More flutters on his neck, but it’s nice this time. It doesn’t tickle, really, it feels….soft. 

So the entire country, no, probably the entire world, will watch him grieve his father and he won’t be allowed to cry then so maybe he should get it all out now. In a place he’s sure he won’t be interrupted, because no one is coming to look for him. He whimpers and swipes at his tears, knowing Philip would be disgusted if he heard him make that sound, would tell him to man up for once and stop --

_ “Baby, you’re okay. ”  _

He sucks in air, trying in vain to get a deep breath around the pressure that is now solidly centered in his chest. The room is spinning and he feels off balance, even though he’s sitting down. No, he’s lying down...when did he…? 

_ “Sweetheart, it’s okay. I’m right here.”  _

He doesn’t have to open his eyes. He knows where he is now. He inhales a deep, calming breath and exhales slowly, resting one hand over both of Alex’s where they’re clasped at the center of his chest. Alex’s arms squeezing tightly to ground him, to keep him from shattering into a million pieces. Alex’s lips pressing kisses to the back of his neck, whispering to him. “Wake up, baby. It’s okay. You’re okay now. You’re at home.” 

Henry turns over and buries his wet face in the warm crook of Alex’s neck. One of Alex’s arms is strong around his waist, while his other hand cradles Henry’s head and strokes his hair. 

“Your dad?” 

Henry nods against him. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knows that Alex already knew that. He’s told Henry before that there’s a specific noise he only makes when he’s having that dream. Henry had asked him if it was a cry or if he yells a word or something, because he felt bad for waking Alex up. Alex had said no, it wasn’t loud. “I mean, it wakes me up but not because…it’s just this sound…” He’d shrugged, pained reluctance on his face. Not for the first time, Henry had realized that a speechless Alex is both fascinating and frightening. When he finally spoke, his voice was painfully rough, like he was choking on the words. “It’s like your heart is breaking.”

Now, in their bed, in the dark, Alex is pressing kisses into his hairline and murmuring things Henry can’t really process but it doesn’t matter because Alex is holding him so tightly that Henry can’t help but feel safe, can’t help but let himself be loved. Let himself, finally, be found. 


End file.
